Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Good documentation Fishy. Wish I had of done that. You will really appreciate that a couple of years down the track.

Off topic, I like your shade cover brace.. does it stay fixed and you drop it into the FT to put the lid down or dou you remove it.

Its kinda like a car bonnet support. Love it.

cheers charlie, it fold up into itself. i used 25mm PVC for the frame and then used a 50mm to 25mm T piece which acts as a hinge. so as i lift the lid the stand arm falls down and i rest it on the ibc frame hopefully the pictures show it more clearly .

and here is the update i been waiting for

ph 7.4
amonia 0
nitrites 0
nitrates 20 (not sure if its normal for them to drop so rapidly)
water temp 23.

I as well like your shade cover very groovy

quick update

got 13 barramundi :rockette: they seem to be settling in well. i put 2x300w heaters in the tank to make sure the temp doesn't drop below 20. morning temp today was 24 and afternoon 29.

when feeding them should i turn the pump off or should i leave it on and let the water push the fish food around ?. also the guy i bought the fish off said not to feed them for 4 or 5 days not sure why but should i be taking this advice ? i suspect its either so the ammonia doesn't spike to high or the fish get hungry enough to learn to feed on pellets.

It's an ammonia thing. They have had a bit of stress, best not to exacerbate the situation by loading them with ammonia too! I never turn my pump off. So I don't think it matters during feeding.


Congratulations on the fish!

had some really good weeks weather wise, but as soon as i got the barra the temp has droped so dug up some aquarium heaters and managing to keep the system about 22 over night and around 24 during the day.

when i open the lid of the tank they go deep i throw fish food in and they stay deep in the tank, i walk away and come back a hour later and the fish food is gone. even when the water was up towards 28 they were the same, the pump is pumping the water out across the surface and pushes the fish food to the edges. so its a bit hard to tell how much to feed them ATM.

apart from the harvesting lettuce and spinach like crazy.

With the barra I found it best to starve them for about 2 weeks, thn they took the feed

ammonia spiked to 0.75 today and nitrates at 0.25 systems still adjusting to the addition of the new fish. cant see the fish feed yet so not sure if im feeding them enough.

backup system is in action, its been running for 5 days so fare no probems yet. consists of a 100w solar panel a 38l/m air pump and a 80a/h battery.

seasond some goldfish with some salt for a hour before they come fishfood

having trouble getting the barra to eat floating pellets, so i have been crushing some of the pellets but the barra still wont feed of the top just the crushed ones(i cant watch if ther eating the sinking ones as they spook easily) feeding temp yesterday was 27. might have to switch to sinking pellets.

Havnt done a update for a while everything is going crazy even the bugs eating my cabbage. (i call it sacrificial planting lol) bugs only really eating the cabbage.

barra still not eating the floating pellets they wait till the sink, so bit hard to tell how much to feed them. barra might be small by the end of the summer.

more pictures

more pics

Hi fishyink,

Nice setup you have there!

Regarding your solar setup. Assuming your charge controller is a 12v and a non-mppt one; and you are using it to charge a 12v battery bank. Even though the solar panel voltage is rated at above 12v, which it normally is, then the charge controller will draw the panel down to 12V, so the power draw will be limited because of this.

However, if the charge controller was the MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracker) kind then it will make use of the full panel voltage allowing it to then up-rate the amps, making the most of the power draw from the panel.

Cheers,

Mon

Hi,

Apologies - my brief/quick explanation of how MPPT charge controllers work was neither good nor entirely accurate.

Below is a link to explain it much better and in more technical terms:

http://www.mysolarshop.co.uk/Solar-pane ... i-230.html

Cheers,

Mon

hello fisyinks im new to this game and im looking at starting can you please email me a plan of yours ??